Major disruption: The crane severed overhead lines as it fell onto the train tracks. — Bernama
PETALING JAYA: Train passengers from the south and north have to disembark between the Sungai Buloh and Serendah KTM stations to be transferred to the next station to continue their journeys following a crane mishap.
A crane toppled onto the train tracks at the Rawang station, and also severed overhead power lines, on Tuesday evening.
The mishap affected three rail services – KTM Komuter, Electric Train Service (ETS) and the cargo service.
With the school holidays beginning this weekend, remedial work is being carried out at a frantic pace to restore services.
KTMB Group chief executive officer Datuk Mohd Rani Hisham Samsudin said in the meantime, a temporary bus service has been activated for passengers as all train services passing the Rawang station were disrupted.
He said KTMB provided 18 shuttle buses for ETS passengers and six shuttle buses for KTM Komuter passengers to transfer them to other stations.
“Remedial work at the affected site is being carried out. We hope work can be completed within 24 hours,” he told reporters at the Rawang KTM station yesterday.
Rerouted: Passengers disembarking from their train at the Sungai Buloh station. — AZHAR MAHFOF/The Star
He said repair work involved cable installation, replacement of faulty components and testing of power supply.
Following the disruption, Mohd Rani said passengers on the KTM Komuter and KL Sentral-Tanjung Malim route had to disembark at the Sungai Buloh station, adding that those on the Tanjung Malim-KL Sentral route will get off at the Serendah station.
On the ETS service, he said passengers on the Padang Besar-Gemas route will get off at the Tanjung Malim station.
He said passengers could board shuttle buses from the Tanjung Malim station to the Sungai Buloh station to continue their journey to KL Sentral and Gemas by the ETS train.
“For the Gemas-KL Sentral-Butterworth and Gemas-KL Sentral-Padang Besar routes, passengers can take the ETS train from KL Sentral to the Sungai Buloh station.
“From there, they can take a bus to the Tanjung Malim station to continue up north via the unaffected ETS train route,” he said, adding that KTMB staff and auxiliary police would be at the stations to guide passengers during the disruption.
For passengers who do not wish to continue their journey, Mohd Rani said KTMB would make e-wallet refunds.
At 5.35pm on Tuesday, a crane used for a multi-storey carpark project next to the Rawang KTM station collapsed onto the railway track at KM355.749 between the Rawang and Kuang KTM stations.
Mohd Rani said the crane tilted towards the track, causing the upper part of the crane to break into four parts before falling onto the tracks.
He said the incident caused disruptions and delays for more than two hours for the ETS and KTM Komuter services on the KL Sentral-Tanjung Malim-KL Sentral route, affecting 7,000 KTM Komuter and 3,000 ETS passengers.
He said the numbers were expected to increase to 30,000 - 20,000 KTM Komuter and 10,000 ETS passengers.
Mohd Rani said KTMB acted swiftly by deploying certified personnel to perform power supply insulation work on the affected routes.
